Yishai: Conversion Law Must Pass

Interior Minister Eli Yishai said that his party, Shas, would demand that changes to the conversion law be voted on at the beginning of the Knesset's winter session, after the High Holidays. Shas plans on raising the law for a Knesset vote with or without the government's agreement. Last week, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said that he was opposed to the law, which would give the Chief Rabbinate more authority over conversions.

Yishai said that failure to pass the law would lead to a split among the Jewish people. “What do they want, that a special database of 'kosher' Jews be established, or that the High Court should authorize reform conversions,?” Yishai said in an interview in the Yom LeYom newspaper.